The Business of Travel

The Official Blog of the Global Business Travel Association

Thai-based hospitality group Minor Hotels has purchased an additional stock in NH Hotels, increasing its holding to 94%, Business Traveller reports. The purchase will enable Minor Hotels to expand in Europe, while also allowing NH Hotels to put down roots in Asia.

Icelandair has signed an agreement to buy budget airline WOW Air for nearly $18 million USD (approximately €15.9 million), Buying Business Travel notes.

According to France24, Airbnb is being sued by French hoteliers for unfair competition. The main trade group for French hotels, The Union of Trades and Industries of the Hotel Industry (UMIH) accuses the home-sharing company of “knowingly violating” certain imposed rules.

Birmingham Airport has unveiled a £500m master plan to increase capacity and improve the traveler experience, Buying Business Travel notes. The investment aligns with the airport’s desire to grow traffic by 40% (to 18 million passengers annually) by 2033.

Over the next 20 years, China will account for approximately 19% of the world’s aircraft demand, Business Traveller reports. According to Airbus’ Global Market Forecast, the country is projected to require nearly 7,400 new passenger and freighter aircraft.

Star Alliance is putting virtual reality technology to the test in select lounges, Business Traveller writes. Travelers flying through CDG in Paris and FCO in Rome can try out the virtual reality systems, which may eventually be offered on planes and across lounges globally.

The TSA will begin testing new technology that can screen multiple passengers from up to 25 feet away, Los Angeles Times reports. If the terahertz screening devices pass the initial tests at a TSA facility, they may be further tested at U.S. airports.

According to IATA’s latest 20-Year Air Passenger Forecast, air traffic could double to 8.2 billion travelers in 2037. The forecast also outlines China, the United States, India, Indonesia and Thailand as the fastest growing aviation markets.

A no-deal Brexit would result in 5 million fewer outbound trips made globally by 2022, Travel Weekly reports. These findings come from a new study by Euromonitor International. They also claim Spain will see the brunt of this, since UK travelers account for nearly 21% of inbound revenues in the country.

Related Posts

Week In Review

We kick off this week’s news highlights with some positive news from a GBTA study released this week showing that most travel managers (72 percent) are satisfied with their salary. Average total compensation rose 6 percent year over year and the study also showed that travel managers enjoy significant benefits.
Late last week Frequent Business Travel reported on United’s changes to their mileage program and their announcement of additional requirements for elite status. In related news, Scott McCartney of The Wall Street Journal’s Middle Seat blog shared how frequent fliers are hunting for loopholes in new mile award programs.
Delta confirmed this week that it will go with Airbus in a big 50-jet order according to USA Today, which also reported that Airbus will deliver its first A350 in mid-December. Also in aviation news this week, The Hill’s Keith Lang says the Federal Aviation Administration is touting its NextGen implementation in Texas.
JetBlue joined the majority of U.S. airlines this week when it announced it will start charging customers to check bags. Southwest remains the last big airline in the U.S. to ...

Week in Review

For Earth Day, airports and airlines are marking the day with environment-focused special events, according to USA Today.
In major news this week, the Los Angeles Times covered a recent GBTA Foundation report showing China has surpassed the United States as the global leader in business travel spending. Entrepreneur also reported on the reasons behind the lagging growth in U.S. business travel this year, and noted that companies are maximizing their travel to make it as cost efficient as possible. "Business travel is not a perk, it's a necessity," GBTA's Mike McCormick told reporter Carly Okyle.
ABC News reports that airlines are looking to make window and aisle seats a luxury meaning you could be paying more to get out of the middle seat. Airlines seat size has been making the news a lot lately and you won't want to miss this video from Fox and Friends where they ask if it should be the government's role to regulate comfort and seat size for airlines.
Hotel Marketing took a look at the social side of hospitality this week reporting on a Cornell ...

Week in Review

The Week in Review keeps you up-to-date on the latest business travel news. Last week’s GBTA poll on how North American businesses are reacting to the Ebola situation continues to make news with coverage in Roll Call. GBTA Executive Director Mike McCormick once again spoke with the New York Times about the importance of getting the situation under control. Ebola continues to be a fluid situation in the states: the Los Angeles Times reported that the two Dallas nurses and the NBC cameraman are recovering nicely, but CNN reports a new case involved a New York-based doctor who recently returned from Guinea.
Shifting away from Ebola, Reuters reported U.S. airlines have raised their domestic fares by $2 on average last week, marking the first industry wide increase in half a year. We predicted this increase in our most recent U.S. BTI Report.
The Atlantic’s City Lab chatted with Amtrak President and CEO Joseph Boardman about the state of U.S. Passenger Rail. In this candid interview, Boardman discussed ridership growth, why they need huge amounts of federal taxpayer money to maintain ...

Week in Review

The business travel industry is at the forefront of today’s global economy. There is always something going on and it can be hard to keep up on it all! This new weekly post is meant to give you a quick overview of the week’s top business travel news stories.
The week started with lots of buzz from SAP’s acquisition of Concur last Thursday. In ComputerWorldUK, SAP CEO Bill McDermott tells why Concur is worth $8.3 billion and calls Concur the best business case he’s ever put in front of the Board.
Concur Chairman and CEO Steve Singh onstage at GBTA Convention 2014 in Los Angeles
The fight on cell phone voice calls on planes is fully underway. In USA Today, Bart Jansen writes about a group of 77 House Members who wrote Monday to the Federal Communications Commission and the Transportation Department urging against lifting the ban on cellphone calls aboard planes. GBTA’s Shane Downey, director of public policy, spoke with Ellis Booker in this Information Week article about why cell phone calls on planes will be more than just annoying, they ...

Week in Review

Last weekend, an air traffic control glitch caused major delays hitting Washington, D.C. and New York especially hard. GBTA called for a top-to-bottom review of the air travel disruption calling it an unacceptable outcome and pressing for a close examination of the long-term planning process.
In better news for consumers, Slate reports that airline ticket prices are getting cheaper. Alison Griswold writes that when the Consumer Price Index for July was released, it showed that the index for airline fares fell a striking 5.6 percent from June to July—the biggest one-month drop since December 1995.
The Washington Post reported on a new pilot program that will allow you give federal agencies feedback on how well they served you. In the coming weeks, passengers at Reagan National, LaGuardia, Los Angeles International and San Francisco International will see kiosks where they can give immediate feedback on their TSA experience.
JFK airport is trying to manage your expectations about waiting in lines by using beacons to monitor mobile phones so signage can display accurate wait times in hopes of reducing passenger frustration and to notifying ...

Week in Review

It was a busy week for business travel news! On Monday, U.S. News & World Report wrote the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly confirmed Coast Guard Vice Adm. Peter Neffenger as the new leader for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) by a vote of 81-1. GBTA urged the new TSA administrator to conduct a top-to-bottom independent review of the organization.
Carry-on bags stayed in the news this week after GBTA and others last week called for IATA to permanently scrap their proposal to decrease carry-on baggage size by 20 percent. Travel Daily News reported on a GBTA poll showing travel managers overwhelmingly opposed IATA’s guidelines. Scott McCartney, Middle Seat blogger for The Wall Street Journal wrote about the carry-on bag dilemma saying airlines are promising something they can’t deliver. He interviewed GBTA’s Mike McCormick for the article who called it death by a thousand fees saying it’s not just the issue of carry-on bags itself, but the underlying issues of airlines continually raising prices and adding more fees to the pile.
The Guardian reported that over the weekend around 1,400 passengers of the ...